Earthjustice, DEC put court action aside on terminal plan

By Brian Nearing

Updated 6:26 pm, Tuesday, June 10, 2014

The state Department of Environmental Conservation and opponents of a proposed oil terminal expansion at the Port of Albany have agreed to put aside legal fisticuffs — at least for now — over a DEC ruling that the project posed no threat to the environment.

Terminal operator Global Companies wants to install a heating plant to make incoming crude oil easier to pump from rail cars in cold weather. Opponents fear this means Global will import Canadian tar sands oil, but the company has neither confirmed nor denied that possibility.

On Monday, Earthjustice, a national environmental group, filed a legal challenge in state Supreme Court to DEC's ruling in November that the Global project posed no threat to the environment. It was the last day that such a legal challenge could be filed under state law.

Last week, DEC warned the group that it would consider such a challenge frivolous, and would seek to make Earthjustice pay the state's legal costs.

But since then, the two sides have worked out an agreement in which Earthjustice filed its challenge, and both sides will ask the judge assigned to the case to issue a stay that will keep the challenge in legal limbo until after the state concludes its public comment period on the project in August.

Under the agreement, DEC will ask the court to "maintain the status quo without ruling on the merits" until DEC decides its earlier environmental ruling on Global was final or Sept. 3, whichever occurs first, said DEC spokeswoman Emily DeSantis on Tuesday. DEC also agreed it would not seek legal costs under the agreement, which will fend off the issue for about three more months.

Public opposition to the Global project has grown after a series of crude oil train derailments and explosions, including one in Quebec last summer that killed 47 people. Oil trains are now common sights at the port, where both Global and another company, Buckeye Partners, have state permission to handle about 2.8 billion gallons of crude annually.